Keith Ellison keynotes CAIR gala in NYC

Over the weekend, Congressman Keith Ellison (who also serves as deputy chairman of the DNC) was the keynote speaker for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) New York chapter’s annual gala.

CAIR was founded in the early ’90s with the explicit goal of raising both financial and legislative support for the Hamas terrorist organization that now rules the Gaza Strip. The group was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism-financing case in U.S. history. It is now designated as a terrorist organization in the UAE.

The New York chapter of CAIR is one of the most extremist-connected entities of a national organization that positions itself as a civil rights group. Quite a few CAIR-NY staffers and officials have in the past expressed support for Hamas and other fringe groups.

Current CAIR-NY board chairman Zead Ramadan has compared “anti-Muslim rhetoric” in America to the Nazi treatment of the Jews. Ramadan has also pointedly refused to condemn Hamas.

Former CAIR-NY board member Lamis Deek has offered support for Islamist uprisings against the “imperialist” United States. Deek also urged Muslims not to comply with federal counterterrorism investigations.

Cyrus McGoldrick, another former CAIR-NY official, has explicitly endorsed Hamas. In 2015, McGoldrick flew to Iran and went on its state-controlled media channels to curse the United States.

The current CAIR-NY legal director, Albert Cahn, recently represented the family of Akayed Ullah, the suspect indicted in the New York subway bombing. In a statement to the press following the attack, Cahn said he was “outraged by the behavior of law enforcement officials” in dealing with Ullah’s family.

Conservative Review found that the Ellison-endorsed book calls for physical violence against Antifa’s opponents. “In truth, violence represents a small though vital sliver of anti-fascist activity,” a passages from the book reads.

We also recently learned that Ellison has a continuing relationship with the anti-Semitic preacher Louis Farrakhan, who is also a Nazi admirer and a 9/11 truther. Ellison has met with the bigoted Nation of Islam leader at least three times since entering office.

And Ellison recently attended a private dinner hosted by the president of the terrorist regime in Iran.

The DNC deputy chair’s career has been rife with conspiracy theories and fringe positions. His embrace and promotion of the terror-tied CAIR is just Ellison’s latest move in a congressional tenure filled with controversy.

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this piece incorrectly suggested that Albert Cahn was a lawyer for the ISIS truck terrorist who killed eight people in Manhattan in 2017. The article has been corrected, and CR apologizes for the error.

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Author: Jordan Schachtel

Jordan Schachtel is the national security correspondent for Conservative Review and editor of The Dossier for CRTV. Follow him on Twitter @JordanSchachtel.